(Google) Earth Day

Since this is Earth Day, it seems only fitting that I spent the day doing workshops for SCETV on Google Earth. I did one basic session, which covered getting use the the controls, searching, basic placemarks, and learning how to manage layers and folders. The second session was an advanced session where we started embedding media into placemarks.

Things went great in the first session. Usually, this group had folks that haven’t worked with the program before, so there is a huge “wow” factor. Therefore, this one tends to be lots of fun to teach. I like watching the expressions of people the first time they see the topography features of the Grand Canyon, or the first time they zoom into a Street View image.

The second session was OK, but just didn’t click like the first one did. First there were the glitches. We were late back from lunch, so I came rushing in one minute before my session was supposed start. Someone had turned all of the lights on so that you couldn’t see the projection screen. There was no easy way to turn off the lights, so I had to go get someone. Then the network started acting flaky.

Finally, I’m not sure this group was really ready for the types of things I was going over with them. Some gave it a valiant effort, but others just really struggled. In this session we were trying to add more information to placemarks by creating links to web pages, etc. You’ve got to add the html code in order for it to work. Say the word “code” and some of them just shut down. Oh well.

Tomorrow I have two more sessions like today. We’ll see how things go now that I’ve been through it once and can refine things.